Silicon Slopes Summit provides launch pad for hungry startups
Art Raymond
8 min read
Kathleen Lynch, Sips Club co-founder, right, gives a drink sample to Sydney Dawson at the Silicon Slopes Summit Startup Alley at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Kristin Murphy, Deseret News
Utah’s long-running Silicon Slopes Summit moved back to its traditional January schedule this year with two days of speakers and networking opportunities at Utah Valley University followed by a two-day Startup Alley segment that kicked off at the Salt Palace Convention Center on Thursday.
Startup Alley provides budding entrepreneurs the opportunity to pitch potential investors and supporters from around the world in one-on-one interactions at an event that, for the first time since launching in 2017, was free for attendees.
Founders from scores of newly-launched businesses manned booths at the convention center and their efforts ranged from brainy AI startups to consumer product innovators and even a few representatives of specialized trades that can track their origins back centuries.
How to spot a parking space
A trio of underclassmen representing both Brigham Young University and the University of Utah set up their area with a live video feed from a camera monitoring a BYU student parking lot in Provo. The camera is part of a network utilized by Spot Parking for a software platform the budding company has developed that powers an app that allows students to identify and locate available parking spaces and also aids parking enforcement officials in monitoring unpermitted use of their campus parking facilities.
Ralf Vonsosen, from Salt Lake City, right, talks to founders of Spot Parking Cooper Young, left, and Dean Smith, center, at their Spot Parking table at Silicon Slopes Startup Alley, an event showcasing entrepreneurs, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Tess Crowley, Deseret News
Launched by BYU students Cooper Young and Ryan Hagerty along with U. student Dean Smith, Spot Parking uses AI-powered software to solve both sides of the parking dilemma that plagues any high-traffic facility and is a particular point of frustration for university parking managers and the students that attend their schools everywhere, according to the founders.
“Initially it was going to be an app for the students, but we quickly realized it wasn’t a viable business model,” Smith said. “We also realized that just as much as students have a problem with parking, their colleges and universities have an even bigger problem with parking enforcement.”
Spot Parking’s software can zero in on vehicle license plate numbers picked up by video cameras and automatically identify cars that are permitted versus those without permission to utilize lots and provide immediate notice and locations to parking enforcement officials. On the student end, the phone app provides parking maps, updated in real time, that identify open spots in campus lots.
Smith said Spot Parking has been able to solve “monumental technical challenges” on the path to innovating technology that is, in many ways, outperforming what is currently on the market.
Attendees explore the Silicon Slopes Summit Startup Alley, where people can show their ideas to potential investors, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Kristin Murphy, Deseret News
And being students alongside running a new business has created its own challenges, but comes with a lot of perks as well, according to Spot’s principals.
“The experience is awesome,” Young said. “It’s the best hands-on class assignment ever. I’m in the business school during the day and learn something in class that I’m later applying in our operations.”
Hagerty, Smith and Young were aiming to connect with new investors at the Startup Alley event that they hope will help fund further product development along with market expansion that could include parking management services far beyond college campuses.
Have a healthy Sip
Sips Club founders Kathleen Lynch and Katy Monson were inspired to start their business, which features nutritional drink mixes that you simply dissolve in water, as part of their quests as moms looking to provide healthy diets for their kids.
“We are best friends that came together as moms realizing we had nutritional gaps in our families and we wanted to fill those and what was currently on the market wasn’t hitting it for us,” Monson said.
Sips Club co-founder Kathleen Lynch, center, talks with attendees at Silicon Slopes Startup Alley, an event showcasing entrepreneurs, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Tess Crowley, Deseret News
Monson, a scientist with over a decade of experience in clinical and laboratory research, said the first product, Protein Sips, was inspired by the need to cut down on sugary drinks with a replacement that was both delicious and nutritious. That was followed up by Veggie Sips, a mix that she said provides wide-ranging nutrition along with ingredients that help maintain good digestive health.
Sips Club launched last June and is currently a direct-to-consumer business with plans to expand its product line, including a new drink aimed at adults that will be available in the coming weeks, as well as potential moves into the retail market.
Protein Sips juice protein drinks are on display at the Sips Club booth at Silicon Slopes Summit Startup Alley, an event showcasing entrepreneurs, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Kristin Murphy, Deseret News
Lynch acknowledged the wide range of products that already occupy the powdered drink market but noted Sips Club was distinguishing itself as an all-natural product that can provide a nutritional boost for all family members.
“Really, I think our value is the idea of whole-family nutrition,” said Lynch, who holds a degree in life sciences. “We created this for everyone. It’s an easy, generational product that every family member can use. And it’s delicious.”
Tick, tock and tunes
Shaun and Lani Phipps were a standout presence at the Startup Alley event for their lack of electronic gadgetry and slick presentation materials, opting instead for a booth that featured handmade signs and a table arrayed with vintage clocks and brass gears.
The low-tech spread was a perfect reflection of the couple’s new business, Saving Time & Tunes, that provides repair and tune-up services for analog clocks and pianos.
The business idea was seeded years ago after Lani Phipps started working for a clock repair shop in Salt Lake City.
Saving Time & Tunes clockmaker Shaun Phipps, left, and bookkeeper Lani Phipps greet an attendee at Silicon Slopes Startup Alley, an event showcasing entrepreneurs, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Tess Crowley, Deseret News
“It all started with my wife bringing home a clock from her place of work and asking if I wanted to tinker with it,” Shaun Phipps said. “So I did and put it back together. Lani showed them what I did and they asked me if I wanted to work there. So I became an apprentice.”
Shaun Phipps went on to work his way through the apprenticeship, learning the trade and eventually becoming a full-time clock repair specialist or horologist. Along with learning the new trade, Phipps said he developed a deep passion for repairing items that are, for many families, long-held heirlooms.
“Both pianos and clocks I’ve come to find are heavy with the sense of family history,” Shaun Phipps said. “That’s what drives me to do what I do, I’m not just fixing a time piece or music piece, I’m saving their memories and sentimental values.”
The Phipps were aiming to attract investor interest at the event, with plans to use the new funding to secure a brick-and-mortar location in Salt Lake City and offering mobile clock and piano repair services around the state, noting that clock repair, in particular, appears to be a dying art.
“A lot of clockmakers have been going out of business, especially here in Utah, in the past four or five years,” Shaun Phipps said. “Many small towns, even small cities, no longer have a shop and customers with repair needs have to travel hours to find someone.”
Saving Time & Tunes clockmaker Shaun Phipps holds a clock at Silicon Slopes Startup Alley, an event showcasing entrepreneurs, at the Salt Palace Convention Center in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Jan. 16, 2025. | Tess Crowley, Deseret News
Lani Phipps, who oversees the finances for Saving Time & Tunes along with running her own, separate accounting business, said they’ve conducted market research around the state and found many areas without repair service options and the few clock repair businesses that remain are very busy.
“We repair because we care,” Lani Phipps said. “We want people to keep those memories, to have these clocks around to pass to the next generation.”
The 2025 Silicon Slopes Summit continues on Friday with the final day of Startup Alley along with its Million Meals community service project, open to all, that is aiming to pack 1 million meal donations for the Utah Food Bank.
